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North American F-86 Sabre
Whether by design or accident, Biggles tended to avoid flying jets until Biggles in the Terai, but the F-86 Sabre was one of the leading Western Cold War fighters and the Johns novels could hardly have avoided mentioning them. The Sabre first entered service in 1949 with the USAF and was one of the first swept wing transonic fighters. Large numbers were produced and the type saw extensive service during the Cold War and in the years after. Practically every Western ally used the Sabre. Canada and Australia licence built their own Sabres. The Canadian variants, built by Canadair, also served with the R.A.F., equipping 11 squadrons. The Sabre is the most produced western jet fighter and the last operator, Boliva, retired its Sabres as late as 1994. The F-86 Sabre and Biggles In Biggles Buries a Hatchet, Pat Manton was an American F-86 pilot based in Japan. He was patroling the waters off Sakhalin when his engine failed and he had baled out. He was subsequently captured by Russian troops on the island and imprisoned in Onor prison where he met Erich von Stalhein. Pat escaped and was brought back to Japan by Biggles who had gone to Sakhalin to rescue von Stalhein. On the way to Japan from Sakhalin, Biggles was pursued by a flight MiG-15 fighters. After an urgent radio call to the USAF liaison officer Colonel Cyrus Bradfield, a flight of F-86 Sabres from Manton's own squadron was despatched and they drove the MiGs off. The F-86 in derivative works ''The Gun Runners In this comic published by Action Comics of Sydney, Australia, a flight of F-86 Sabres turned up at a critical moment to attack a weapons dump maintained by bandits in the jungles of Malaya. The attack also destroyed a bandit force which was moving to capture Biggles and Ginger who had been shot down earlier. In the context of this story, the fighters were most likely RAF aircraft based in Singapore. Although Sabres served with the RAF in the 1950s, most of them were deployed to Germany and there is no record of any RAF Sabres based in Singapore. Slutspel I Kalahari F-86s were, rather incongruously, used by the Slavonian Air Force. The fighters were launched and penetrate Austria airspace to intercept Biggles and co. in a Douglas DC-3. They had just escaped from Slavonia and were enroute from Vienna to Britain when this happened. A flight of generic nondescript Austrian jet fighters beat off the intruders. De valschermspringers An F-86D located the crash site of the Lockheed Constellation which the international spy Dillonk had hijacked enroute from Hong Kong to Manilla. Indo China Intrigue In this Action Comics story, Biggles had been sent to Indo-China to rescue Prince Diera of Cholon who had been kidnapped by some rebels. F-86s belonging to the Cholon government forces respond to Biggles' call for help and attack rebel forces at a critical moment, allowing Biggles, Ginger and the Prince to escape. The Saboteur'' In this Action Comics story, Biggles and Ginger were sent to Canada investigate a string of sabotage incidents which have brought down several Canadair licence built F-86 Sabres. To test a hypothesis about how the sabotage may have been done, Biggles test flew one F-86 which blew up as he expected. He just managed to eject in time. Later he took off in another F-86 to pursue the saboteur even though he knew the plane may have been sabotaged. Category:Aircraft Category:Actual aircraft Category:Aircraft (canonical works) Category:Aircraft (derivative works) Category:Aircraft which Biggles flew Category:Aircraft which Biggles flew (derivative works) Category:More illustrations to come